JG Cully's writing blog about the Haldred Chronicles series of fantasy detective novels.

Friday, 4 October 2013

Book covers

On Wednesday of this week I met up with my fantastic cover
artist Mat and we talked book covers.
Specifically, ideas for the book covers of ‘Tales of Larrick City’ (my
next book that I’m currently drafting) and my as-yet-unnamed 4th
book.

It got me thinking; what makes a good book cover?

The ‘Lost Fleet’ series by Jack Campbell uses a lot of very
impressive covers, most involving space craft of one type or another which
immediately draw the eye. George RR Martin’s
Song of Ice and Fire novels more recent covers go for simpler but no less
intriguing covers with medieval designs.

For my own books, Mat proposed the idea of having the main
characters on the front cover so that the readers have a visual reference. In the case of Haldred Chronicles: Alyssa, you
have Alyssa (the main character) on the front cover with Malak For Haldred Chronicles: Kalla, Victoria
Haldred herself and Kalla appear on the front cover.

Main characters on the cover’s of novels is nothing new; J K
Rowling’s series Harry Potter traditionally had Harry himself on the front
cover in some scene from the book itself.

My question is, what works for you? What kind of book cover designs do you
like? Those that depict scenes from the
book or characters there-in? Or just
more simple designs with prehapes book specific symbols or locations? What, for you, makes a good book cover? Please comment and share.

Meanwhile, progress has been good with me and book 3. ‘Tales of LarrickCity’
sits at 3500 words so far and is steadily growing. Likewise, having signed up with Goodreads,
LinkedIn etc I am starting to become better integrated with the writing
community on the internet and have seen an extensive increase in likes on my
Facebook page! Big thanks to all my
fellow writers who have welcomed me into the fold.